I don't know anything about the user onboarding numbers but from my blind-folded vantage point it seems like onboarding in the USA and anglophonic countries is non-existent anymore.

I've had friends that created Steem accounts, didn't understand the "value" of the system and were here mostly for the "alternative social media" possibilities... they have since departed and left their accounts to rot (probably forgotten their keys and are permanently locked out). If they ever saw a reason to come back, they will have negligently set themselves up for further frustration when they have to create new accounts that now do not benefit from nearly as much "beginner bonus" Steem granted. I don't dare try to convince them to get into Steem again because inevitably they'll perceive it as another instance of me pointing them to a dry water trough and will ruin my credibility. I venture to guess a lot of Steemit users probably have the same fear... so the word-of-mouth networking is amounting to mostly crickets chirping in darkness.

Myself, I stayed... and since I've been here I've found informational value from alternative sources. I watch though, and I see how some of the "bad acting" whales who's only contribution is to hold high stake and bash minnows and planktons to death with it using the unbalanced flagging system makes for a toxic cancer that's seemingly incurable.

I'm not knocking holding stake now... I'm only upset that no number of cooperating individuals will ever be large enough to match the power of one whale who has the system reinforced monopoly on vote power.

Supposedly whales are incentivized to delegate to good content contributors and or to upvote quality content. I don't see it. The feed seems to bear witness now to the best content remaining unviewed (without bot investment) and those content creators becoming disillusioned and leaving for more useful investments of their time and energy.

It's clear I am conveying a massively negative perception about all this, but I do actually hope that there will be some changes to the "social" aspect of this platform such that all of your economic predictions/speculations for Steem will come true. I do think though, that pleasing the baseline of users ought to be the highest priorities for the whales and developers because without new users (who stay and participate), this ship aint sailing nowhwere. :)